Squid | The Great Escape First Fifty

Squid headlined The Macbeth venue in Hoxton for the first night of this year’s Great Escape First Fifty events - a series of gigs in East London this week to preview the 2019 festival’s line up. In association with So Young Magazine, the band filled out the venue to the back after playing a series of showcases across London for the last few months, and it all accumulated here.

Their new song ‘The Dial’ released just this summer gone was the moment the audience connected with the band the most. It  is always a hit and miss for new bands to find an audience pay attention, let alone singing along to their music, but Squid conquered the challenge, even with only a handful of songs released to their name as of yet.

Squid’s music is as curious as their band name. They are funky and random, centred around taking advantage of everything live instrumentation has to offer, including the saxophone in their otherwise rock-inspired sound, and with undoubtable merit.

The band are most commonly compared to LCD Soundsystem, though they share a quirky sound fuelled by manipulating amps, this comparison is sometimes misleading as there are some very unique ‘Squid’ moments.

To watch the band is interesting, as their drummer contributes a huge lead on the vocals.  This rare set up is telling of the band’s unique, do-it-our-own-way attitude which differentiates them to other guitar-led bands on the grassroots music scene. Towards the end of the set, all the band members joined in to make a very vibrant performance, projecting a whole range of sounds between just the five of them. There is no doubt they would be able to hold a crowd in their own headline tour, and no doubt in 6 months, they’ll have a sizeable audience queuing to see them at The Great Escape.

The Great Escape First Fifty continues for the rest of this week, so be sure to get a head start on the best of the best for next year’s festival!  

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